Profiles

Boer War record :
Arrived at the Standerton Concentration Camp on 14 May 1901 Aged 70 years - Prisoner No : 148 233 Occupation : Farmer from ' Cornelia ' Vrede District of the Orange Free State - 100...

Standerton

People in this camp

1242

People who died in this camp

1068

Few camps can have had as miserable a start as Standerton. The camp was probably begun about December 1900. Before it was handed over to the civilian administration in February 1901, the local district commissioner had put Mr van Musschenbroek in charge but the camp was left ‘(more or less) to run itself’. There were no records of arrivals or departures as families poured in, while some were deported to Natal or transferred to other camps. A small camp which had been started at Platrand was also amalgamated with Standerton, although a black camp remained there. These movements took place in the bucketing rain in which the local black pot clay dissolved into a ‘deep thick glutinous mud’. General Superintendent Goodwin reported in February 1901 that the condition of the people was ‘pitiable in the extreme’. To add to the woes, Dr Leslie, who had been sent from Cape Town, took one look at the camp and refused to take up his duties, causing ‘considerable inconvenience’.1

It was hardly surprising that the Boer families were bitter and Standerton remained a disaffected camp for many months. The people complained that they had been taken from their homes with no time to collect any belongings. Goodwin was sceptical. He admitted that it was probably true in some cases but many families brought a considerable quantity of furniture with them. The people were also incensed about the food, for the system of restricted rations to the families whose men were on commando was at first implemented in Standerton. However, Goodwin took the decision by the end of February 1901 to move everyone in the Transvaal camp system onto Scale A, with Scale B (which lacked meat) used as a means of punishment of the ‘unruly and troublesome’. This, he believed, ‘materially assisted in obtaining a better feeling throughout the various camps, and encouraged both the men and women to be more helpful’. At first W.K. Tucker, a capable man who soon became General Superintendent of the Transvaal camp system, was sent to Standerton as superintendent to straighten things out.2

But Tucker did not remain long. He was replaced temporarily by Richard Moffatt and later by Frank Winfield. Winfield was something of an enigma. His bland, confident reports suggest a man who was in control of affairs, but he was much disliked by the Boers and later inspections of the place revealed a parlous state of affairs. Winfield was not entirely to blame, for Standerton’s harsh climate, relative isolation and heavy clay soil all made for great discomfort. The Vaal river was heavily polluted and Standerton village was dirty and insanitary, contributing to the endemic typhoid which plagued the camp. Throughout its life tents were ragged and in short supply. The place made a poor impression on visitors and Lucy Deane of the Ladies Committee described the place as ‘hideous and simply a Charnel-House! of dead cattle’, many of them scattered along the banks of the river http://www2.lib.uct.ac.za/mss/bccd/Histories/Standerton/

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